


Heart's Echo

by Magnavox_23



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-23 05:35:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/618673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magnavox_23/pseuds/Magnavox_23
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If he can hear her, she can't possibly be wandering off getting into trouble can she?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heart's Echo

**Author's Note:**

> Written for merrykk for the 2009 dv_exchange.

Daniel turns his head towards the pleasant sound floating in the air. It isn’t the first time he’s caught Vala humming a little something to herself on some of their more mundane missions. A syllable here and there, perhaps a few obscure words, probably from her native dialect. It’s almost a comfort to him - if he can hear her, she can't possibly be wandering off getting into trouble can she? Not that trouble is easily had on this little planet.

The place would be Eden if not for the humidity. At least Abydos had been a dry heat. It’s mid morning and already Daniel's socks are a tad moist. But the landscape is beautiful. Luscious forest, not too dense, colourful alien birds – Vala had likened to them to flying turkeys. A neat little path running directly from the Stargate to a quaint temple that Daniel is currently seated within, studying the Ancient derived writings etched on the entryway.

Vala's 'securing the perimeter' consists of wandering along the temple walls, tracing her fingers over the bumps and grooves of the etchings, all the while humming that alien ditty to herself once more. 

"What *is* that tune?" Daniel doesn’t mean to sound as cross as he does, even to his own ears, it’s just frustrating him that he almost recognises it, then just as it’s about to click, he losses it again.

“Amhrán”, Vala replies flippantly, pretending to study the alien words beneath her fingertips more closely.

“Song” Daniel mutters the translation to himself, rolling his eyes before turning back to his work. He hears Vala exhale sharply as she plops down beside him, resting her back against the wall right next to his workspace. She holds her head high, pointedly looking out in front of her, not meeting Daniel’s eye. “It was taught to me by my first love” she intones wistfully.

“It’s hard to imagine you having a first love”. The words are out before Daniel fully realises what he is saying. “I didn’t mean it _that_ way, I was just…”

Vala stiffens slightly, before rising again to take a few steps in the direction from which she came. “There are less hurtful ways to display your torturous jealousy, Daniel”. Her half smile makes Daniel’s heart thud uncomfortably for a few beats. Why on Earth did he say that? He knows she is covering poorly for the hurt of his dismissal. He knows she never, ok _rarely_ lies about her past any more. And he really is interested in her story, but it was a knee jerk reaction to not fall for her words, something he’d conditioned himself to do not long after they met. 

The soft crunch from beneath Vala’s boots follow her exit from the temple as she strides off into the forest, only silence on her lips.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Daniel’s in his lab when he gets the call; a disturbance in Vala’s quarters. For a split second horrid images run through his mind of the myriad of ways in which she could have injured herself – from slipping on the tiled floor of her en suite, to jumping off the bed, broken bones and blood flash before his eyes. He grabs Vala’s extra passkey from his top drawer; the one Vala had slipped him suggestively one night in an attempt to get him out of his lab at 2am; and bolts out the door.

Once he rounds the corridor leading to Vala’s quarters, Daniel is quite out of breath, he hasn’t sprinted that fast, even off world in some time. Since the defeat of the Ori he has to admit to spending a lot less time in the gym and reigniting his love affair with chocolate walnut cookies - Vala’s fault entirely - she wanted to immerse herself in Earth’s cultural offerings and Daniel thought it best to leave the Victoria’s Secret shopping to Sam.

A trumpet announces his arrival at her door. Threads of up tempo piano and a beat of drums escape from behind it and a frustrated airman bangs furiously once more yelling “Miss Mal Doran!” but Daniel can barely hear him over the racket. He motions for the airman to stand aside, showing him the passkey and motioning to the electronic lock on Vala’s door.

Daniel breathes deeply before running the passkey through the lock and stepping inside. The wiggling of Vala’s ass greets him as he enters, followed by the rest of her body, shaking and shimmying around with her back turned to him, oblivious to his presence. He finds himself smiling at her antics. She’s not the best dancer, but she certainly has moves. He then remembers the door is open and promptly turns to close it behind him, shielding Vala’s ass from the curious airman outside. 

Daniel determines the stereo on her dresser to be the culprit and makes his way over to turn it off. As the music is silenced in the blink of an eye all that’s left is Vala’s voice, suddenly bereft of a tune to guide it wavering as Vala swings around surprised to see Daniel staring at her from the other side of her room.

“Daniel!” Vala exclaims loudly, probably due to temporary deafness after such loud music. “This ‘jazz’ is similar to the music I had in my village as a child, isn’t that exciting? Maybe my people took it with them when they were taken from Earth by the Goa’uld millennia ago!” She bounces towards him like a devil child on a sugar high, grabbing the CD cases, re-reading them once more in the hopes of learning something new since the last time.

“Well jazz only really came about here around a hundred years ago, but I suppose it wouldn’t be too unusual for something similar to pop up elsewhere, we’ve seen it before.”

Vala frowns at his words, “Then it was you who copied us!” she announces.

“I don’t see how either could copy…”

“Why did you barge your way in here then? Decide to take me up on that offer darling?” She gestures to the passkey in his hand as she changes the CD over. Daniel grabs her wrist as she’s about to insert the disc. “Actually, I was called up here to put a halt to your loud music”. He takes the disc from her and puts it back in its case. “This place may be made from four inch concrete, but it’s not soundproof”.

“Oh.”

“Oh indeed”. Daniel is still smiling to himself as the images of Vala twirling around and singing replay in his head. He helps pack her CDs away, and buys her an iPod for her birthday.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

They spend the afternoon of her ‘Unbirthday’ – so named because Vala’s not sure how to convert her home world’s calendar to Earth’s and refuses to tell anyone how old she actually is; though Daniel’s already spoken to the Tok’ra and done the math – ripping/buying music and loading the songs onto her iPod. Daniel sighs as Vala pulls yet another distracting literal version of a well-known compilation up on YouTube instead. He’s sure she doesn’t understand half the jokes, but the idea that someone is singing about what is happening in an obscure music video has obviously caught her fancy, so he lets her watch what she wants. While his back is turned, she Rick Rolls Teal’c via email.

From then on, white earphones are a constant for Vala’s already highly customised uniform. Daniel tells her not to wear them to briefings and Cameron shows her how to hide them under her shirt. After the ‘thin concrete walls fiasco', Vala rarely hums along on base; that she saves for offworld.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Another hot and sticky world and Daniel finds himself lying awake in the middle of the night, a sleeping Vala beside him in their tent. This world is silent, no bug life, well, any prone to making soft nightly noises anyhow. The only sound is a muted sax coming from the earphones in Vala’s ears. How can she sleep with the volume up so loud? Daniel wonders. He debates to himself the merits of turning the iPod off and possibly removing the earphones without waking her. Ten minutes later when the bass is echoing in his own eardrums, Daniel finally makes his decision and rises quietly from atop his sleeping bag.

Her face is smooth with sleep, pale skin with a light sheen of moisture from the heat. Hair plastered to her brow but totally unaware as he props himself up on one elbow and leans over her. Sometimes he forgets just how beautiful she is – self-delusion is a not so wonderful thing. Her features are exotic, not in the same way as Sha’re’s, and not better or worse, just different. He’d found himself attracted to Vala from the get go and was surprised she’s never called him out on kissing her back that first time on the Prometheus. She’s complicating and infuriating and god, he knows he is falling.

He follows the white cord with his eyes… which disappears right down the centre of her camisole and on to parts yonder. Damn. 

“Like what you see?” Vala’s voice is way too loud in a still night. She can’t hear herself and Daniel realises she thinks he’s looking at her breasts… which he sorta is.

“Sorry” he mumbles looking away immediately and trying like hell not to blush.

“What?” Vala asks just as loud as before.

Daniel hesitates before facing her once more and reaching over gently to remove one of the earphones from her ear. “I was just…” Her hair is soft to the touch, silken in a way Sha’re’s never could be. Harsh desert life and curls made combing near impossible, let alone the amount of care Vala puts into her hair. Daniel catches himself staring again. “Um, I was just going to turn the music down…or off” he finishes under his breath, “It’s quite um, loud".

“Well I need it to sleep, it’s soothing, and this song has been stuck in my head for way too long!” Vala moves her hand to rest over her stomach, where her iPod is hidden in defiance.

“Well I can’t sleep with it so loud and how is listening to a song over and over supposed to get it out of your head?!”

“It just does!”

Daniel hrmpfs and rolls back down on his own sleeping bag, thoughts of Vala’s hair and breasts forgotten as he comes as close as he dares to throwing a tantrum. He is silently pleased that Vala is just as close to doing the same. After a few moments, Vala huffs in frustration and fishes the iPod out from under her shirt. Daniel tries to resist the urge to look. She makes a show of turning it off and slamming it down beside her.

They lie is silence for fifteen minutes, both knowing the other is still awake and trying not to be the first to make a peep. Another ten minutes and Vala sniffs, then starts to quietly hum to herself. It’s that tune again, the one from her home planet and Daniel’s curiosity is peaked once more, but he doesn’t want to break the spell by asking again. The words are soft and barely intelligible, “Moy chroí i machalla, níi ais”. Daniel immediately relaxes, Vala’s voice is much more soothing than the digital sound from the iPod. She hums a few words then murmurs the rest, beginning to let fatigue wash over her once more. “I deyontaas tú áit i moy chroí”. When Daniel’s breathing evens out, she knows he’s asleep, only then does she tapper off her song quietly and allow herself to be drawn under also.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"Shit!" Daniel swears again under his breath when he realises Vala is unconscious once more. "No no no, wake up", he lightly slaps her face and Vala opens her eyes once more to find herself wrapped in Daniel's arms. The small camp fire in their little cave barely gives them enough light to see by and Vala remembers the cold, both outside and inside her.

"Hey" Daniel smiles at her as she tries to focus on his face. "Do you remember where you are?” 

Her lips are dry and she has to wet them a few times before she can answer. "P4X-5...um, 7?"

"Close enough" Daniel chuckles lightly, glad that she's waking again.

"The river. I fell in the river.... and my head. Oh god Daniel, it's cold!" She huddles closer and Daniel tries to wrap the sleeping bags around them tighter. She scared the hell out of him the few times she lost consciousness already. After slipping on those icy rocks, and bashing her head before toppling into the river; Daniel had plucked her out easily enough, only getting his feet wet, but with the temperature dropping rapidly and the gate a fair hike away, the best he could do was take shelter here and warm Vala up as much as possible while keeping her conscious in case of a concussion.

Her eyes start to flutter closed again and Daniel rustles her awake, "C'mon, stay with me".

"Mmm tired Daniel" Vala murmurs into his shoulder.

"I know" he soothes, "But you have to stay awake for me. Talk to me… tell me a story". He feels the muscles in her neck slacken from his hold on the back of her hair. "Tell me about that song, the one you sang in the temple, do you remember?"

Vala huffs, looking up into his eyes, searching. "I thought you didn't believe me" she smiles in resignation and closes her eyes, this time in pain. 

"I was afraid to", he admits.

Her laugh dissolves into a coughing fit and Daniel wonders if maybe she swallowed some water while she was in the river. She's exhausted, but he has to keep her going, if only until their scheduled check in is missed and the SGC can reach them on the radio.

"'Chroí’s machalla', it means 'heart’s...", "echo'" they both finish together. "It's an ancient tale about a young girl who yearns for her love. She… she enchants her own heart to search for another, to beat twice as fast as before in echo to theirs. Veron taught it to me, we were ten."

"Wow, that's ...young?"

"Well he knew what he wanted and he went for it. Charmed me like no other." She offered a weak smile. "I would have married him, but on my 15th birthday, Adria; my step mother, sold me into domestic service after my father had not returned in more than a year. I wasn't worthy any more in his parent's eyes and they moved on from my little corner of the galaxy."

They're both silent for a while, Daniel taking in Vala's story and Vala quietly reliving it. Finally she asks in a soft voice "Do you believe it's possible for someone so young to feel so much?" 

Daniel tightens his arm around her. "Yes, I do. I think when we get older we forget just how much we felt when we were younger. It's easier that way; to forget."

Even facing her, Daniel can't tell if Vala's shaking is from the cold or from emotion. His hands come up to frame her face and he leans his forehead against hers. "Thank you" he whispers a breath from her lips – for her story, her trust, her everything. Daniel runs his fingertips over her dry cheeks, cupping her jaw, and running through her hair. Vala in turn reaches up to touch his face, the beginnings of stubble tickle her skin and they finally allow each other to feel. 

It's minutes or hours later that Daniel's radio crackles to life. "Dr Jackson, Vala? Please respond..."

**Author's Note:**

> Vala’s language is based on rudimentary modern Irish from an online translator and I just futzed with the spellings. I don’t pretend to know anything in particular about the language so all mistakes are indeed mine.  
> amhrán – song  
> moy chroí i machalla, níi ais – echo in my heart, not returned  
> I deyontaas tú áit i moy chroí – I grant you a place in my heart  
> Chroí’s machalla – heart’s echo


End file.
